Improving Facial Appearance in Cleft Lip & Palate Patients Through Early Intervention
Our society places a premium on beauty and pleasing facial esthetics. The quest for improving the appearance of patients with facial differences has led to the development of techniques that have markedly improved the esthetic results in patients born with a cleft lip and palate. Prosthodontists have an integral role in the interdisciplinary care that these patients receive. Advances in cleft management techniques over the last decade have greatly improved the esthetic and functional results of cleft repair while reducing the associated stigmata of the condition. The prosthodontist serves an important role in the care of these patients from birth through adulthood. There is increasing evidence that intervention during the earliest stages after birth may result in predictably better outcomes while reducing the number of surgical procedures a cleft patient will be required to undergo to achieve an acceptable functional and esthetic outcome.
1. Develop familiarity with the infant cleft lip, palate and nose anomaly.
2. Become familiar with nasoalveolar molding (NAM).
3. Have a familiarity with the advantages and disadvantages of NAM and GPP.
Lawrence E. Brecht, DDS, is the Director of Maxillofacial Prosthetics in at New York University College of Dentistry. He has a joint appointment at the Institute of Reconstructive Plastic Surgery of New York University School of Medicine where he is Director of the Dental Services and serves on many of the Institute’s reconstructive teams. In addition to memberships in many prosthodontic organizations, he is currently the president of the American Academy of Maxillofacial Prosthetics as well as the president-elect of the Greater New York Academy of Prosthodontics. He is a frequent contributor to the plastic and maxillofacial prosthetics literature. He also maintains a practice limited to prosthodontics and maxillofacial prosthetics in New York City.
